When I read Mitch Moxley's 'Welcome to Vancouver: 'No Fun City' I was pretty upset that an occasional visitor decided to really attack the place I live and love.
Sure, I've heard plenty of people use that phrase and discuss some of the shortcomings that there are here in Vancouver. I feel the need to answer his musing that Vancouver is '... a black hole of boring?"
I guess it's a question of working out what is fun for each of us and address this opinion. My friends and I find this city to be a lot of fun so let's look at the evidence.
For those that love the outdoors there is so much. The North Shore is a mountain biker's dream. It is also home to three ski hills and you can ride them until 11 p.m. at night, every night, during ski season.
There are also countless hiking trails and some pretty decent post-activity restaurants and bars. In addition there are also many beaches to fit many people - Third Beach for the hip, young crowd, Wreck Beach for the more liberal, Kits Beach for the people that want to be seen and so many more.
Kits Beach was even named in the Top 10 Sexiest Beaches in North America. The city is also pretty friendly, these days, for biking and there are so many more things for the outdoors enthusiast too. There is even a 'Bike Rave' in the summer where hundreds of people create a rolling musical evening.
For those that love food, drinking and dining with friends there are so many areas to frequent, such as Chinatown, Mount Pleasant, Yaletown, Kitsilano, Granville Island. There are so many different kinds of food. Mitch, have you ever used Yelp! or checked out the local foodie bloggers to find great places to go.
Even if you go alone you can be guaranteed an amazing meal and are most likely going to meet some great people too. There are also food festivals including the Vancouver Food Cart Festival, Hopscotch , Dine Out Vancouver -- and others. You can eat out every night of the week all year and not return to the same place (although you will because some are just great).
Ok, here is the contentious point -- clubs and bars. The B.C. Liquor Control and Licensing Branch (LCLB) regulates liquor service in bars and restaurants, private liquor stores, liquor manufacturers and importers, Ubrews and UVins (for personal liquor manufacturing), and liquor service at special occasion events. Agreed that it can really restrict the fun that we can have, however we need to take it upon ourselves to ensure that we create fun wherever we go.
This is where you need to do work. Get to know the people who work in great bars around Vancouver (try Gastown, Mount Pleasant and Chinatown as a start) and then you will find out how much fun there really is. You may even find the after-hours places and secret clubs that are just so legendary. Also, check the local papers for bands that play in so many places. The biggest and best come to Vancouver and truly love it. Use meetups, dating sites, social groups, teams and whatever to tap into the local scene and meet people. It's easy really with a little effort and a will to be sociable.
This article just scratches the surface of what there is to offer and there are so many community activities happening that I cannot describe in this short article. I'm bored in hearing the 'No Fun City' moniker. In fact I think that Vancouver is 'More Fun City' and so do many people here.
Post what you feel makes Vancouver a 'more fun city' in the comments and share with your friends, family and colleagues and let's show the world the true side to Vancouver.
Follow Nikolas Badminton on Twitter: www.twitter.com/nikolas_digital
Vancouver, I love you but nowhere is perfect. As a city, you have beautiful, open and welcoming beaches, mountains and a cosmopolitan but small downtown core but you can be a lonely place. What's missing, for me, is community - not community events, places to go, sports to play, outdoor adventures to be had - but the most important aspect of community; a more inclusive, open and welcoming people.
Vancouver is a cliquey city and I have found that while people here are helpful, friendly and polite, there have been few and far between that will go out of their way to be inclusive or that will let you get to know them better before a considerable amount of time has passed. Also, Vancouver can be a transient city so people do seem to make you work harder for their friendship and take a while to become what you could comfortably call a friend, perhaps in an effort to see whether you will settle in the city for more than a few years. For example, in comparison to other cities, there are many more young Australian/ European/ Asian adults that come here on temporary work/holiday visas and study permits and then leave, for example... TBC
aside from the fact Vancouver has the most expensive food on earth, Vancouver also has the most unfriendly pretentious people on earth,
add that to the most expensive bars in the world and lowest wages in North America does not make for a fun city.....and the cold climate,long dark winters, short daylight hours, constant cold rain don't help in the fun category
Vancouver is a very small irrelevant city that's why there is no NBA or MLB, and no celebrities will ever live in Vancouver
in Vancouver i sent out 20 resume's and got 0 calls..in Toronto- 20 resume's and 18 calls .......most jobs to be had in Vancouver are commission based or $9/hour security guard
THIS is totally "bogus and superficial".......and a gross lie. Vancouver was a cool city, and ALWAYS had been international in flavour, and not "British".....it was Vancouver. The self-serving and revisionist and often racist history of Vancouver before the influx is recognizable to those of us who lived here before (I mean "racist" as being racist towards non-Asians...). This "great addition to the article" is just as bogus as the rest of the rah-rah crap that comes up to counter the truth of the "no fun" equation. The bias towards Vancouver before how much better the Chinese made it (for other Chinese....) is ugly and complete; this claim about it being a sleep British enclave is so much f'ing hogwash.